Library Superconference!

What an amazing experience! The presenters and displays were phenomenal. I had the pleasure to convene a session on Social Justice and World Issues in the Elementary School. Picture books and novels were presented to help Teacher Librarians incorporate social justice and equity teachings into our program. Some of the books suggested were Child of Dandelions, Give a Goat, I Will Make Miracles, The Jacket, Jericho Walls, March On!, Rickshaw Girl, Running Shoes, Wangari's Trees of Peace, When I Grow Up, I Will Win the Nobel Peace Prize.

Welcome to the Library!

The school library needs to be a positive learning environment for all. Creating a motivating, caring environment is paramount for student learning. Incorporating character education into the programming will also promote a positve environment and having students post and present their poems, writings and character flowers at an assembly were also ways to promote the library.

Genre teaching is another unique way to promote the love of reading. Please post ideas here as to how we can incorporate the teaching of various genres into our library programs.

Forest of Reading

Here are some ideas for activities to go with some of the Blue Spruce nominated titles. Please feel free to add other ideas.

1. Making Grizzle Grow: give students a dinosaur template (I had a number of generic templates for students to choose from). Then I gave them scraps of fabric and they made a colourful dinosaur collage. I reminded them that throughout the story Grizzle grew and changed colours as she became a different dinosaur.

2. My New Shirt: give students a template for a white shirt. Have them write their name in the centre of the shirt using grafitti style art and then draw objects of things that have meaning to them as they create their own "new shirt". Conversely, if you can get your hands on some cheap white t-shirts, students can tye-dye a new shirt.

3. Eliot Jones Superhero: Students can create a new superhero to promote the library. They will make a new superhero and create a poster to advertise the library and the love of reading.

4. Chester: Have students select one of the three characters (mouse, dog, cat) that they relate to the most. Students will draw and make one of these characters and then using a popsicle stick turn them into stick puppets to reenact the story.

Please feel free to comment on these activities and post any ideas that you have for these and the other Blue Spruce books! Thank you.

The TL's Role in the Elementary School Library

I have created this blog to generate ideas for effective school library programs. I would like elementary school librarians to use this blog to post creative lesson ideas to help our teachers and our students develop skills for the 21st Century. Specifically, let's work together to create ideas for information literacy and literacy lessons. As well, any ideas for subject integration and literacy strategy instructions would be great! I know our time is limited and that's why sharing ideas and resources would be great! I am especially interested in library programs at different boards and what people are doing that's innovative and creative.